misbegotten sons
by Domenic
Summary: AU. A collection of stories in a world where an adolescent Tarrlok tries to heal a badly burned child. UPDATE: part 4
1. misbegotten sons

**Title: misbegotten son(s)**

Fandom: The Legend of Korra

Summary: An adolescent Tarrlok tries to heal a badly burned child.

A/N: Tarrlok's backstory roughly based on this theory here at ** post/24281699688/an-analysis-of-the-flashbacks****.**

Disclaimer: I own nothing related to the Legend of Korra.

A fourteen-year-old Tarrlok wondered why Yakone had brought in a small little corpse. Then the thing breathed, and the adolescent startled.

"Tarrlok," his father ordered, "Stabilize this child."

By the way Yakone observed him closely, Tarrlok guessed his father was testing how well he could heal with waterbending again. Trying not to be unnerved and wanting to prove at the very least that he was adequate in a case as severe as this, Tarrlok did his best for the burned child.

He'd hoped the brat would stay knocked out, but Tarrlok's waterbending must've been too clumsy. The moaning and the whimpering and sharp cries grew too much for the adolescent's nerves that he took a minute to shut him up by cutting off enough blood to throw the child back into unconsciousness.

Tarrlok leaned back when it was done, panting with his eyes closed shut, cold sweat soaking his shirt. Physical and emotional stress had done a number on him.

"Well?"

"I t-think he'll live—I mean he will live. I don't know if there's anything I can do for his—his face."

Tarrlok was left with the sinking paranoid feeling that if Yakone could still bend, he could fix it or make it actually bearable to look at, if he had felt so inclined.

###

The brat's name was Amon.

"Is my family okay?"

"All dead," Yakone answered.

Tarrlok's eyes darted from his father to the boy. That really could not have been the best way to break the news. It was even news to Tarrlok himself, the very first thing Yakone had said about where the hell the kid came from.

But Amon didn't make a horrible racket. He just looked shocked, disbelieving, his eyes impossibly wide (and whole, clearly he'd closed them against the fire and that had been enough protection).

"That's—what?"

"You heard me," Yakone said bluntly. "Your family is dead. I assume that was your family I found dead in the wreckage, seven bodies in all."

Tarrlok's eyes darted to the boy's bandaged hands, curling tight in the blanket.

Tarrlok himself felt distinctly like the third wheel, and rather wanted to get the hell out, but for some reason he stayed rooted to the floor. Perhaps it was a horrible fascination and curiosity about the boy he'd just healed.

"You're wrong," Amon choked out in a very small voice that Tarrlok could barely hear.

Yakone grunted. "Mark my words, boy, there's nothing for you left back there."

###

It wasn't like the kid could go back and check anytime soon anyway.

His father kept Tarrlok working on Amon's recovery. Yakone used the burned boy to lecture on the body and the blood's pathways and such. Rather typical stuff for Tarrlok, actually. But he was surprised when his father quizzed the child too, checking to see if he listened when he was conscious. Even more surprising, Amon had; he was able to accurately answer Yakone's questions most of the time. To Tarrlok's chagrin and strange jealousy, he realized Amon answered such questions better than he had when he was the brat's age.

Whenever Tarrlok took a break from their current home's makeshift infirmary to go down to the village, upon his return, he'd find the tail end of his father's conversation with Amon. Always a slow burn persuasion that he was telling the truth, that Amon had been the only survivor he found. Once he'd caught Amon finishing the conversation with Yakone, admitting to what exactly happened: the farm, the firebender, the extortion, the attack, the fact that his family could be all gone, as Yakone said.

###

Worse were the nights when Amon screamed from the nightmares and kept Tarrlok up. And somehow, more often than not, those always fell on the nights that were supposed to be free for Tarrlok, that his father just allowed him to sleep through instead of training in waterbending during its opportune time. And Tarrlok did like that sort of training, there was a certain new energy then—but that was a lot of nights kept awake, and he wanted some to just sleep through. He wanted sleep. Just sleep.

And now there was this brat shrieking in the night. Tarrlok had no idea how his father's sleep fared.

Some nights when Amon kept him up, Tarrlok would just go outside and train more. At least his father would be pleased, and his anger and forced awareness were channeled into something more useful.

But more and more the adolescent was running on empty.

"You're getting sloppy," his father sneered after slipping through Tarrlok's bending so easily and effortlessly hitting all the right points to block his chi. Yakone had also hit the right pressure points to leave him immobile for a few agonizing minutes. Humiliation hitting a crescendo when his father had literally kicked him when he was down, one quick pointed strike to his chest that cracked a rib. Afterward Tarrlok could barely muster the energy to properly heal his own chest with waterbending. He bandaged himself, and applied the bruise cream.

The adolescent noted that Yakone changed Amon's bandages, and his temper flared, an inexplicable anger flashing before dying down, but not dissipating.

That night, Amon screamed from another nightmare. Exhaustion and anger now joined by pain from his bandaged chest finally made Tarrlok snap.

He had stepped into the screaming boy's room, and simply bent just so, and Amon was quiet.

But awake, Tarrlok made sure he was awake.

"Keep. It. Down." The adolescent did not raise his voice. The scarred boy looked at him with wide, watery eyes.

Tarrlok released him, and Amon was quiet the rest of the night. But other than the bloodbending and a new raw terror in the child, it was not unlike other times where Amon screamed from a nightmare. He would then did go quiet after that outburst, but Tarrlok could not find sleep again in the resulting silence before dawn arrived and the night utterly lost to the him. And so it went again even after that extreme action, Tarrlok could not get to sleep no matter how sprawled out he was on the bed, and soon he felt the sun on his back and his father's voice beckoning him to get up for morning practice.

But Amon was much quieter afterward, until the boy no longer made a peep. Tarrlok slept more soundly then. Yakone gave an approving nod at his training after such energy was renewed. But his comment about Amon's growing quiet and restraint with his nightmares was pleased and knowing and entirely directed at Tarrlok alone. The adolescent felt an uncommon surge of genuine joy at that particular show of approval from his father.

###

In the transition from bandages to cloth wrappings on his face, Amon had finally gotten a good luck at his scars.

The boy choked back a strangled shout when he caught Tarrlok's eye, resuming silence.

The adolescent was surprised. He hadn't even meant to shut the boy up again. Really, Tarrlok wouldn't have blamed Amon for screaming at his reflection. And it yet it was rather...informative, to know the boy still had that fear, and how it controlled his actions. Tarrlok filed the information away, for some later use, perhaps.

###

Yakone kept Amon around even when he was fully recovered, new scars notwithstanding. In fact, with the boy back in functional shape, Yakone and Tarrlok were back to their nomadic existence, now traveling with a third. Tarrlok didn't question his father, though he dearly wanted to.

He wasn't sure if Amon questioned Yakone either. Perhaps in private, but it was never something Tarrlok saw. Perhaps not, Amon was a young brat, he should be pretty malleable. And Yakone had the authoritative air to make anyone listen, whether it was the Red Monsoons he'd led before, or his only son. An orphan he pulled out of a fire should be no trouble to get under control, though Tarrlok had no idea why Yakone would want to. By now it was clear the boy could not bend. It seemed pointless to continue keeping him around. He'd just slow them down. What use could he be?

###

Tarrlok should have realized sooner that Yakone did not intend to leave Amon useless if he was to stay with them. He certainly hadn't with Tarrlok. Yakone began training the boy in earnest, sharing his knowledge of chiblocking and martial arts. When Tarrlok had been younger, his father had told him that the comprehensive study of waterbender healing and bloodbending had a lot of crossover with chiblocking, those disciplines requiring extensive knowledge of how the human body functioned. It had made it all the more easier for his father to make the jump between the two combat styles after Avatar Aang had removed his bending.

Still Tarrlok knew he missed it. Had preached that bending was still superior. It was an unspoken truth Tarrlok was Yakone's last link to bending, and had to be appropriately honed.

And Tarrlok himself...for so long he had wanted to please his father. And he truly was learning something very useful.

###

Watching Amon train was odd for Tarrlok. It felt sort of like seeing his younger self. Except the boy was largely quiet, only speaking when necessary, such as when answering Yakone, or when coming up with his own questions. And to Tarrlok's growing annoyance, though Amon did struggle with adjusting to combat training, he seemed to fight and absorb information faster than Tarrlok had ever done at that age. Though perhaps Tarrlok was just seeing things. Jealousy and all. He was unused to his father splitting his attention like this, and with no warning, Amon's arrival had been so damn random and out of the blue.

Yet there was a benefit for the brat taking away some of father's attention. Some pressure relieved, more free time to be had in the local village below their current mountain home. Not that this village had much per se; Tarrlok had seen better. But the seamstress' apprentice, Chihiro, was particularly lovely, with a pleasant laugh and an appealing figure to behold.

"Take Amon with you."

Even the brat had to intrude on that. Tarrlok obediently if grudgingly obeyed his father's orders.

At least Amon was on his best behavior, and was quiet as ever—so, the usual, actually. Tarrlok couldn't really blame the boy for trying to stick close to him. He'd done the same when they passed through villages, his covered face always attracting at least one wandering eye.

"Ah, Tarr—oh my, who's this? Your younger brother?" Chihiro put down her basket of cloth, looking at the boy closely.

Amon flinched, and Tarrlok rolled his eyes. "Adopted," he conceded. It was pretty much the truth, and not the harmful sort, not like oh, say, "my father is an infamous criminal whose bending was taken by Avatar Aang." Yeah, definitely not.

Chihiro cooed over the boy, which rather amused Tarrlok, especially since Amon became so flustered. And he found it effective, negotiating discounted cloth prices and even another date with the girl.

In a better mood, Tarrlok took Amon to more of the stalls, buying him sweets and a book that might interest the boy, remembering how much he'd liked reading at his age.

"Where are the pictures?" The boy said, as he flipped through the book.

Rolling his eyes, Tarrlok said, "In your head; you make them up."

Amon snapped the book shut, held it close and looked down at his feet.

Tarrlok blinked, then sighed. "You can't read, can you?"

The boy shook his head.

Tarrlok sighed, running a hand through his hair. "Right, farm boy."

He caught Amon's scowl, but made no further comment.

###

Yakone never said anything about it and Tarrlok nor Amon ever told him about the reading and writing lessons. It was weird for Tarrlok to be teaching anyone that sort of thing, but not exactly an excruciating process. Amon took to those lessons as well as he did with Yakone's training. He seemed to enjoy them too, a new light entering his eyes as he practiced his letters or sounded out the words.

###

Yakone did say something when he caught wind of Amon asking to spar with Tarrlok, who kept making excuses instead of giving a straight answer.

"So you think you're ready to take on a waterbender, whelp?" Yakone questioned the boy, who ducked his head, and again Tarrlok was left feeling stuck in the middle between them. He supposed it was a consequence of essentially being the waterbender and bloodbender in his father's place.

"Fine then. Go ahead."

The boy looked at Yakone with surprise, then ran off to get ready. Yakone whispered in his son's ear, "No quarter."

Tarrlok figured his father wasn't that serious, he had to give some. And apparently what he gave was adequate, for Yakone made no comment, just walked over to a groaning Amon on the floor and ordered him to tell him what he did wrong.

Yet that night Amon crept into Tarrlok's room, eagerly asking what he thought about the quick spar that day, what advice he had. The adolescent felt rather flattered the boy went to him for combat knowledge as well, not just his father.

###

On Tarrlok's fifteenth birthday, Yakone took Amon to that night's training session.

The adolescent blinked at the boy, confused. Amon looked just as baffled as he. At least more normal sleep patterns were the only concession Yakone made for Amon's age, and he had no waterbending that obviously required immediate night training. Brat was usually asleep while Tarrlok and his father sparred.

Tarrlok shook it off, though Amon still looked confused. The adolescent figured Yakone had decided Amon would join night training now. _Good luck with that_. Tarrlok had noticed that the boy looked as if he was about to fall asleep on his feet, and Tarrlok knew from personal experience how his father would react to _that_...

Yakone knelt down at Amon's side and whispered something in his ear. Immediately he looked much more awake, and looking at Tarrlok with eyes wide with terror. Tarrlok blinked again. Brat hadn't looked at him with such naked fear since the night he'd shut him up. Amon returned his gaze to Tarrlok's father, his eyes sharing that same fear.

Yakone just smiled, whispered something else in the boy's ear, patted his shoulder. He then stood up and addressed Tarrlok, whose back immediately stiffened to attention.

"Son, you've made some improvement in the forbidden arts, but you're still nowhere close to adequate."

Tarrlok forced back his scowl and focused hard on what his father was saying. "You've done some humans before, but I want you to leave this one alive tonight." And Yakone gently pushed a trembling Amon forward. "You've already done so before with him, though very subtle work—rather impressive, actually—I expect the same control now."

Looking down at Amon, rooted to the ground in terror, the adolescent felt some reluctance. The brat really wasn't so annoying. It was nice to have someone other than father at home. And in between fear that had been constrained to small bursts and currents, Amon had regarded Tarrlok with something like worship lately. The brat seemed so appreciative and pleased when they sparred and trained, and got to tag along on his trips to the village, seemed so grateful for the lessons in reading and writing.

But spirits, even this much hesitation now earned his father's disapproval and shame. Unacceptable.

Tarrlok reminded himself of how Amon had kept him up at night before. Reminded himself of still current petty jealousies: Amon still seemed to learn faster and better than he had when he was his age, Amon was a nonbender like father was now, father just randomly brought him home and now split his attention between him and his only son, his _real _son. Reminded himself how even now Amon made him look weak in front of his father...

Still Tarrlok reminded himself _control_, _control_ as he bent the boy to his knees. Still Amon struggled, and Tarrlok found himself not wanting to push back too hard, remembering his father's earlier order and how the brat had given him beads for his birthday this morning to tie into his hair.

The adolescent watched the boy clutch at the grass and quietly cry, eyes glaring and burning up at him. Tarrlok tried to ignore the pure hatred and rage and absolute helplessness roiling around inside them.

###

Tarrlok wasn't surprised when Amon ran away. Or tried to.

Yakone had brought him back, and after their 'talk,' his father practically dropped the boy at Tarrlok's feet. Tarrlok went about healing Amon again, and the boy's confusion was apparent, torn between being miserable and thankful.

"Tarrlok?"

"What?" The adolescent grumbled as he lay on a pallet next to Amon in the makeshift infirmary, back turned toward him. He thought the brat had finally fallen asleep.

"Where's your mom? I've never seen her."

"Dead."

"Sorry."

"Why? You weren't there," Tarrlok asked with genuine confusion.

"F-for what?"

Tarrlok was silent.

"How did she die?"

"She wasn't burned like yours, if you were wondering."

Back still facing the boy, Tarrlok practically heard Amon's flinch.

Tarrlok shut his eyes again. "I was about your age when she died though. And you're training in what killed her."

The adolescent heard Amon's breathing stop suddenly.

"One touch, and she was helpless, couldn't bend, couldn't move, and then...well, I think you know the rest."

The boy breathed again, but stayed silent, and Tarrlok went to sleep.

###

When he was better, Amon tried to run away again, and this time Tarrlok helped him.

"He'll be back," Yakone said, confident. Still Tarrlok waited for punishment, but father never said a word, was just more brutal in training, which was something manageable.

Father was right. Amon found his way back, hurt and tired and starving, weak.

"You have no place else to go," Yakone told the boy left crouching at his feet, Tarrlok silently watching.

"...No," Amon whispered, breathing harshly, his eyes red.

Yakone nodded, satisfied, and passed Amon to Tarrlok for healing.

Amon never said exactly what happened on his own, leaving it all to Tarrlok's wild imagination.

While tending to the boy's bruised back, Tarrlok carefully said. "You're young now...but when you're older—even a few years older—you can probably fend for yourself better then."

Amon bowed his head, and Tarrlok said nothing more.

###

Yakone told Amon a nonbender could be formidable, but still lose out to a master bender. Amon disagreed. At least the boy didn't bring up Tarrlok's mother, for which the adolescent was endlessly grateful for. He had no idea what his father would do if she was brought up.

Predictably, Yakone summoned Tarrlok.

The boy had gotten better, and so Tarrlok let him get a few hits in before employing something he'd always held back on Amon before. After knocking the boy away, Tarrlok gathered the water back to him and bent it into a sphere shielding him and blocking Amon's increasingly wild strikes. Rather than shaped like piercing shards, Tarrlok bent out a stream of ice pellets shooting for Amon. The shots were too wide for the boy to side-step and too closely spaced to properly dodge.

All he could do was defensively block. Tarrlok knew it was childish panic and instinct that compelled the boy to shut his eyes too. And so Amon blindly pressed forward. Tarrlok waited for Amon to give up, but the kid kept pushing ahead...

Catching his father's eye, Tarrlok frowned and bent a larger, faster fragment of ice more the size of a small boulder and sent it slamming into the boy, knocking him brutally down.

Tarrlok began to approach the moaning boy, scowling as he drew up the water to fix him, but Yakone spoke. "Make him get up, Tarrlok."

The adolescent sighed, and carefully bent Amon's blood. It was twilight, and the boy was too tired and hurt to resist much. But as Tarrlok bent his body upward into a kneeling position, Amon shot him that familiar bitter look.

###

"Tarrlok...would you still bend blood, if your father didn't want you to?"

"'What ifs' like that are pointless, Amon."

It was Tarrlok's only answer.

**A/N: It was interesting trying to write teen!Tarrlok and kid!Amon and creepy Yakone.**


	2. release

**Title: misbegotten son(s): release**

**Fandom: The Legend of Korra**

**Summary: A young Amon is left alone with Yakone when Tarrlok leaves.**

**A/N: Tarrlok's backstory roughly based on this theory by birdbrainblue at tumblr.**** And ep. 9 pretty much confirmed it.**

**Disclaimer: I own nothing related to the Legend of Korra.**

Amon was seven and Tarrlok seventeen when the latter left.

The younger boy helped Tarrlok saddle up the ostrich-horse during the night.

Yakone watched from the balcony of their current Bai Sing Se apartment. Amon hadn't seen it, but he assumed father and son had said some form of good-bye already. He just noted how focused Tarrlok was on the ostrich horse and seemed very determined not to look up. As ever, Amon made no comment.

The beast was packed, but Amon still fiddled around with the straps. His anxiety was returning. He remembered his oldest siblings before the fire. The twins had been Tarrlok's age and wanted to go, but stayed to help with the farm. Maybe if they had left, they woudn't have died too...

Tarrlok stepped around the ostrich-horse and knelt down to Amon's eye level. "You can still come," he again offered.

"...You're already packed," the boy softly pointed out, and winced at his own weak excuse.

Tarrlok rolled his eyes, cursing as he snapped up. "Do whatever you want." He began to mount the beast, until Amon tugged at his leg.

"What now-?"

Amon just insistently tugged again, and Tarrlok stepped down with a sigh. Tarrlok stiffened as the boy hugged him tight around the waist.

Finally Tarrlok awkwardly returned the hug, stiffly touching the child's shoulders before pulling away and mounting the ostrich-horse.

"I'll miss you," the boy said, looking up. Tarrlok didn't look at him, just stiffly nodded. And then he kicked the ostrich-horse and ran off.

Tarrlok never looked back, and never once at Yakone's balcony.

Amon watched until he could no longer see Tarrlok. Then he went back inside.

###

The first time Tarrlok offered to let Amon go with him, it had devolved into an argument.

"Just because you'll be gone, doesn't mean I can't handle Yakone by myself now," Amon said, though he knew that wasn't his reason for declining. He'd actually been surprised Tarrlok had offered at all. He had thought the adolescent wanted to get away from him as much as his own father. Maybe the boy was letting the sting over that linger and cloud everything.

"Says the brat who's known him all his life—oh wait..."

"It's not like he can use me as a bloodbending dummy even if he really wanted to!" Amon snapped, and immediately regretted it. Tarrlok's eyes flashed, and they were angry—but the hurt and guilt in them bothered the younger boy more.

That lasted a second before Tarrlok replaced his sneering mask and huffed, turning his back on Amon.

"W-wait, I didn't mean—look, I only want to learn more chiblocking from your Dad," said Amon. That was the only reason he could pin down out of all the conflicting emotions he had when Tarrlok said he was leaving. The boy looked away. "And I know he doesn't need bending to be...dangerous," Amon said, finally settling on the best term. "But—"

"—I'm more dangerous?" Tarrlok's voice was terse, bitter.

Amon startled. "I wasn't going to say—"

"Forget it," and Tarrlok stalked off, and Amon bit his tongue. Should he say more, share what he thought, should he stay quiet? Not for the first time Amon wished he had someone else to advise him about this sort of stuff. Usually he actually could go to Tarrlok about some things, but definitely not in this case where he himself was the problem. Yakone wasn't viable in this context.

The last time Tarrlok had asked, at least Amon shared that he'd miss him, which was true.

###

"Why didn't you try to go with my son?" Amon startled, and Yakone slipped in and broke his stance, sending him to the ground. Yakone continued. "I know you wanted to. You were tempted at the very least."

Amon looked up, ignoring the ache in his back. He mulled over Yakone's "try." Was he suggesting that he would've stopped his departure like Amon had worried? The boy had to admit, Yakone's reaction was a factor in refusing. And the very first time he'd tried to run away, Yakone had dragged him back and beaten him. But oddly enough, Amon was mostly worried about Tarrlok and Yakone arguing more; the boy found he didn't want the two to separate on any worser terms. They were still family, even if Amon truthfully thought Yakone was a terrible father.

Even with Amon around, the man still pressured his son to bend even his blood, break an arm or make him submit. Yakone made him watch sometimes, mostly whenever they got into another argument about benders versus nonbenders and ostensibly to show that even an experienced chiblocker like him would still fall to a bender. Later in private after picking up on his distress, Tarrlok told Amon it wasn't new, he'd been doing it since he was small. If that was Tarrlok's attempt to reassure Amon, it didn't work, and the boy wasn't sure if it was still more disturbing to watch bloodbending happen to someone else or experience it himself. But he knew it bothered Tarrlok, and Yakone ultimately had all the control. No matter what nonanswer Tarrlok gave, Amon had grown certain he wouldn't being doing something so invasive if not for his father.

But Amon also noticed with trepidation how the adolescent's face seemed to close off more and more as he bloodbent, like he was caring less, and those times Amon began to feel like Tarrlok was barely seeing him.

For all that Amon knew (and understood) that Tarrlok wanted to please his father, he watched the adolescent continue to argue more and more with Yakone. It had been during an argument that Tarrlok snapped he would leave. The adolescent had seemed too angry to be really upset, but Amon knew that was stupid. Anger only happened when people were upset, and Amon thought Tarrlok would be even more distressed if things got any worse between him and Yakone. Amon believed that was something to be avoided. Maybe Amon just lost all sense when it came to considering families.

"I—"

Amon went with the answer he'd given Tarrlok before, the only one he really understood at the time, and ignored his current epiphany. "—I want to learn more chiblocking. I want to be a master."

Yakone grunted. "Keep you from ending up like your family—for the time being, anyway."

The boy's eyes narrowed, and his heart pounded, angry. He told himself this wasn't the first time Yakone had brought up his family like this. Tarrlok had told him part of it was seeing if the boy could keep his concentration (and that part of it was his father being a bastard). Amon had told Tarrlok he could handle Yakone. Tarrlok wasn't around to even occasionally try to smooth things over for the boy if Yakone was actually irritated.

Still Amon snapped, "I don't get you. If you really think bending beats everything, why even bother? You tell Tarrlok victory is everything."

The boy swallowed hard, realizing what he said. He'd been avoiding mentioning Tarrlok ever since he left. He wasn't sure how Yakone would react to mentioning his son.

Yakone's chuckle meant nothing with regards to danger or safety. "I told _Tarrlok_—not you."

"Why should I be so different?"

"You can't bend, simple as that. How many times do we have to go over this?"

"Not my fault it's stupid! Bending's not better! It's _different_, but it's not better!"

"It's not 'stupid,' and it is 'better,' it's an..." Yakone seemed to search for the word. "...unspoken law. Immutable."

Amon snarled, "I thought you liked breaking the law?"

"No breaking this one, kiddo."

"Right—because the last time you broke any law, you lost your damned bending—"

And Amon snapped his mouth shut, terrified. But Yakone just smiled. Too widely.

They finished their spar, and Amon was left aching, and the boy thought that was it, Yakone had just been rougher.

But the next day they began to pack again, and Amon was disappointed. This would surely make it harder to communicate with Tarrlok if they hit the road again. Then again, it wasn't like he had sent any letters already. He probably wouldn't, probably just said it to calm Amon.

###

Amon turned 8 once they made it to the mountain range near Republic City again. At what was clearly their next campsite, Amon blinked; it was an actual cabin. Amon wondered who lived there. It wouldn't be the first time they had taken shelter with strangers.

Amon followed Yakone, expecting him to knock, but he just opened the door. Amon amended his conclusion; maybe this was one of the safehouses Yakone had left over from his crime lord days.

They settled in, unpacking and washing up and having dinner. The boy thought it was too quiet. It often was now. Tarrlok had been the most talkative.

After dinner, Yakone took Amon down to the cellar.

"Is that for storing food in the cold?" Amon asked when he saw the large metal box.

Yakone just opened the door, and Amon peeked in. Smooth metal all around, no icing to keep anything cold inside.

The boy was puzzled, until he was shoved inside, banging his knees on the floor of the box.

The slam of the metal door rang in his ears. He bolted up, sting in his legs forgotten.

"_**Yakone**_!" Amon screamed, pushing and banging at the door.

"Do you know the story of Hama?"

"_Let me out_!"

"I think you do. Tarrlok knew it too."

"_Open this door_!"

"I needed my son to be sufficiently motivated. The only way he was getting out was if he made me unlock this door."

"_You can't do this_—!"

"Yes I can, and I don't even need to bend for this. But you do."

Amon panted against the door, his eyes wide and wet. He listened to Yakone continue to speak.

"Tarrlok was in here for days. It nearly broke him, or it did, but that's not the point—the point is that he could get out. And if not through bloodbending of an external subject, there was always the water generated by his own body, not to mention the snow all around if he had enough range, enough focus—

and of course if I had allowed it. It's pure metal, no earth particles inside, but if an earthbender concentrated hard enough, he could bend the dirt beneath the box and force it open. A firebender with sufficient power could probably blast it open or even melt through the metal. Same for an airbender probably, minus the melting. But a nonbender such as yourself?"

The boy bit his scarred lip and squeezed his eyes shut as Yakone said in a low voice, "You have no chance."

Amon slid down the door of the box as he heard Yakone's feet walk away.

He curled up into a ball and tried to remember how to breathe. Finally he unwrapped his face, but still he felt suffocated.

###

Amon's sleep in the box was uneasy. Didn't really sleep at all, actually.

He examined the box again. There was nothing, nothing, no crack or space. The boy hated the top the most. The bars with their too-small holes, taunting him.

There was really nothing he could do.

Nothing to do but think. Was Yakone really leaving him here to die? Or would he come back?

He thought about his own idiocy. How Tarrlok was right. How Tarrlok had been locked in here too, until he could manipulate the blood in his father and make him open the door. Thought Tarrlok should not have any mixed feelings to his father, he owed nothing to that man. Being family didn't matter with them, not after what Yakone did.

Amon thought about his own family. Was he going to die like them? It wasn't the first time the boy thought that maybe he should've died with them from the beginning. Why had he survived in the first place? Well, that last one was stupid—Yakone had wanted him. He probably would've died if not for him. Probably. Was that it? Had Amon still felt indebted to him? Is that why he stayed even when given a chance to try leaving?

If all Yakone wanted was a bloodbending and healing dummy for his son, why train Amon in chiblocking at all? No, the answer was clear, surely he just wanted him to put up a better fight. It had always been about Tarrlok's development. Amon was certain now. Pretty certain. (There was a time before when Yakone had said almost off-handedly that he might come to think of him as a father too, and Amon had resoundly said _no_, he already had a father.)

Amon thought and thought, and nothing came to mind to escape the box. Nothing. Nothing Amon could do. He was _nothing_.

Yakone was right.

It seemed to take an eternity for Amon to get himself to stop hyperventilating.

It took even longer for him to stop clawing at the door. He did nothing for his bloodied, useless hands, just stared at them bitterly.

###

The boy prayed. He begged. The identity of whom he beseeched would change. Sometimes it was Yakone again. Other times it was Tarrlok. Then there was begging for his parents and his brothers and sisters, even if they were long dead. Just_ please please come back don't leave me here alone to die like this oh gods come back oh spirits_.

Amon prayed to them too. Begged the spirits for anything, any release. Offered them anything for their help, their mercy.

###

The boy meditated. Amon found that when successful it was a good way to take his mind off his fate. It would be a comfort to die in this state. Surely he would feel no pain then. He still childishly feared death just hurting beyond anything else.

Amon opened his eyes again when his breathing shifted, when it started to struggle. The boy gasped—he was in some foggy place, up to his knees in smoke where tree roots arced up in crooked curves. It didn't take the boy long to run, past the point where he knew the box was.

"Giza! Chenzira! Bastet! Isis! Devasha!" He called his sibling's names, eyes darting around. "Mama, Baba!" Surely they were here, surely he was d—

Amon tripped on a tree root, and fell through smoke, back to where he sat with his legs folded in the metal box.

The boy screamed and banged at the door again, crying.

###

Amon felt dried out. He'd gone too long without anything to quench his thirst. His stomach felt numb. He still tried to reach out to that place of fog and roots where he had trouble breathing, but not as much as in the box.

The door opened.

Amon struggled to get up. Yakone looked down at him, absolutely nothing in his face that the boy could figure out.

In the doorway, Yakone propped the boy up into more of a sitting position. Forced water down his throat first, then food. It hurt Amon to suddenly be filled with anything.

Yakone held him without any real feeling, and Amon dozed on his shoulder.

When the boy woke up, he was still in the box.

###

The strange visions inside the box still took him to a foggy space without roots that Amon still waded through, the smoke still crawling up his knees. But now he chased after a large lumbering mountain, certain his answers were there, his release.

He would drop back into the box though, seemingly at the most inopportune time.

Now Yakone let him out at intervals, to spar. Amon found he fought more ferociously, with the frenzied hope that Yakone would let him out for good if he did well. Or maybe he was letting his fury out in any way possible. Was he doing well? He thought he was. Desperation seemed to hone him. He seemed to fight better. Wasn't this what he wanted?

Amon laughed to himself in the box, hysterical. Oh yes, he had got what he wanted. The boy's laughter grew more frenzied. Amon knew he was losing his mind. Those visions were just hallucinations.

But they were more comforting than the box, so he sat and meditated and returned to chasing the mountain.

###

He finally reached it when a clawed flipper lifted up and he climbed on top, walking over to where it connected to the mountain.

Amon thought it odd the mountain had clawed flippers, but it did still have those trees he'd always spied from afar.

The boy considered, then walked back to the flipper. He climbed down it and tried to go deeper into the fog, hoping it wouldn't just drop him into the box too soon. It seemed to work, he sorta swam down through the fog, searching. He thought he found the underside of the mountain. The boy tried to keep one hand on that as he continued searching. The surface changed, became more craggy. His hand soon climbed past a crevice, toward a hole. He stopped when that crevice opened, and spoke.

"Hello, mortal."

The voice was booming but tranquil, and Amon tried to keep calm.

"Hello great spirit," the boy greeted back, trying to be polite as possible.

"What brings you here?"

"I'm looking for my family."

Amon tried not to flinch as the fog moved, the large clawed flipper emerging from it, setting a claw tip to his wrapped forehead.

After a moment of that, the spirit finally said. "You are still alive, mortal. They have moved on."

"To where?"

"Someplace you cannot access yet."

"But it will be soon, won't it?"

"That is not something I can foresee."

"Are there spirits who can?"

"Yes. But many have little patience for mortals."

Amon nodded, and tried not to squirm as the spirit's claw tip slipped down to his chest.

"So few people remember the old ways, but you seem open to them."

The boy was not sure how to respond. He had no idea what the spirit meant. Amon settled for politeness. "Thank you, great spirit."

And when Amon fell again, he felt the claw tip scrape against his chest as he plunged down.

Back in the box, his chest stung. In a daze, Amon took off his shirt and looked down. There was a thin gash there.

For a time Amon had himself mostly convinced that was just from sparring, that Yakone had thrown him against the box's outer edge and he'd cut himself. At least he definitely did not show Yakone the scratch the next time he was let out to fight.

###

"Up. Get up."

Amon just mumbled in his sleep, curling in tighter. He didn't feel like sparring right now. He ignored the hand biting into his arm.

"Brat, get up."

Only one person called him that.

Amon's eyes snapped open, and he sprang up.

"Tarrlok?"

The boy barely had any time to comprehend before Tarrlok yanked him out of the box, slamming the door shut with a shaking hand.

Tarrlok pulled him toward the stairs, and Amon tried to keep up, but soon he began to slide against the floor, feeling woozy. Tarrlok dragged him for a few seconds, before yanking him up and over his shoulder.

"But Yakone—"

"Never mind him," Tarrlok muttered, and Amon thought he saw blood in his hair before he slumped down, unconscious again.

###

Amon knew the box had broke him when the mere sight of Tarrlok frightened him. The adolescent did nothing threatening, he just—Amon had never seen him look so angry before. Not even when Tarrlok had bent his blood because his screaming had kept the adolescent up at night. The resemblance to Yakone grew. Amon knew better than to mention that. He definitely did not want to ask him again about Yakone, whether Tarrlok had confronted him or not—Amon really didn't want any answers to that. Not yet at least.

The boy wasn't sure where he was now, just that it was a place with voices behind the walls, life bustling around him. And it was one space, with two beds.

"Thank you," Amon mumbled to Tarrlok once from his place in a lovely soft bed, half sinking in the blankets.

A wretched look came across the adolescent's face, but Tarrlok said nothing.

###

"You haven't screamed."

"What?"

"From the nightmares." Tarrlok fidgeted uncomfortably, though he sat on the bed with his back to Amon. "I know you have them; when I get back in late, you're shaking like a damn leaf."

"You wanted me to keep quiet," Amon softly reminded him.

"That was years ago," Tarrlok muttered, uncomfortable.

"It's still pointless. And it did hurt my throat." Amon paused to slip under the covers, for some meager protection before he asked his next question. "Why do you care if I scream?"

"...I did when I was let out of the box for good. Dreamed I was still in there."

"I do, too," Amon admitted. He knew by the hesitation in Tarrlok's voice that it had taken a lot for him to say that. "I don't remember how many days I was stuck there."

"It doesn't matter," Tarrlok said with a sudden blackness in his voice, and Amon buried himself deeper under the covers.

###

Amon woke up, groggy. It was still night. His throat was parched. The boy stretched over to the shelf next to him, where the water jug and cup was, and poured himself a drink. He jerked, spilling when he heard Tarrlok's breathless curse.

He looked over to the adolescent's bed. Tarrlok was stretched taut against the bed, sweat soaking through his sleeveless nighshirt. Eyes screwed shut and jaw clenched tight after the curse, a hand fisting into the pillow. His chest rose up and down rapidly.

It wasn't the first time Amon had seen the adolescent in the throes of his own nightmare, but it still wasn't a sight he was used to. It was unnerving to see Tarrlok of all people like this.

The boy slipped out of his own bed and crept over to Tarrlok's. He began trying to shake the adolescent awake, as he had done before.

"Tarrlok, wake up. Tarrlok. Tarrlok, c'mon. Tarrlok. Tarrlok. Brother—"

The adolescent startled awake with a gasp, his eyes unseeing, his hand moving before Amon could comprehend, and soon the boy's hand was twisted back and grasping at nothing, his hand already bent to turn something—

But there was nothing but air, and Amon fell, banging to his knees with his own gasp.

When the boy looked up, it was into Tarrlok's eyes, staring at him over a heaving sweat-soaked chest, eyes wild but comprehending. Then guilty.

The adolescent flopped back down, an angry hand over his face.

Ignoring the sting in his knees, Amon slowly got up and went back to Tarrlok. He stiffly started to pat his shoulder, until Tarrlok pushed him away.

"Just get back to bed."

Amon complied, crawling back in and watching Tarrlok in between the covers. The adolescent still had the hand over his face, his chest went up and down as if awake, and Amon drifted back to sleep before knowing if Tarrlok had as well.

**A/N: So this kinda mutated to being mostly Amon and spirit hijinks with Tarrlok's absence felt and some appearance from him. There'll be more Tarrlok in the next part. Thanks to swan2swan, xcgirl08, and jasjuliet for all the theories about Amon and Tarrlok and about what that ep.9 box was for. Thanks to pteropus717 for encouragement.**


	3. in the gilded city part 1

**Title: misbegotten son(s): in the gilded city: part 1**

**Fandom: The Legend of Korra**

**Summary: AU. An adolescent Tarrlok tries to heal a badly burned child.**

**A/N: Tarrlok's backstory roughly based on this theory here at birdbrainblue's tumblr**.** And ep. 9 pretty much confirmed it. And now that finale double confirmed some things. Oh, that finale. Not a fan of it. So yeah, pretty much ignoring that finale for the most part, while pulling some elements from it. Not only because the finale doesn't leave me with good feelings, but because this fic has its own separate AU continuity now. 'Noatak' will be Amon's alias though.**

**Disclaimer: I own nothing related to the Legend of Korra.**

Tarrlok had to remind himself that Amon was fourteen years old by now. Hell, Tarrlok could've left on his own earlier than seventeen if it weren't for his damned 'Daddy Issues' with a damn capital 'D' that could've filled a series of books. And the fact that said brat had been veritably dropped into his lap and he eventually felt annoyingly tied down to him. Spirits, it wasn't as if this was exactly new. Amon had pretty much struck out on his own at twelve. It was a civil parting, no argument or hellish Box involved as with Yakone; Tarrlok had wanted to stay in the city and continue securing his foothold, while Amon wanted to travel more. Brat had been more confident and really possessed by wanderlust, and Tarrlok reluctantly understood. Still, it had been strange, those first few days without the brat, and Tarrlok was still struck occasionally by the thought of Amon lying dead in a ditch somewhere. But that was foolish—there were letters. Mostly from Amon, as it was easier to address them to Tarrlok in the city, rather than vice versa given Amon's nomadic choice.

Still, when Amon returned to the city, Tarrlok felt some relief, even if it involved bailing the brat out of jail. Even if he hadn't been the only one to do so.

###

"Funny, you're the second guy trying to bail this kid out—maybe you two can split—?"

Tarrlok shot the cop a look. "'Second?'"

"Yep, over there." And the officer pointed to a man with piercing blue eyes and dark hair and an equally dark mustache arguing with another cop. Tarrlok guessed he was a few years older than himself. The man was bruised, with a bandage on his cheek and wrapped around his head. Both the mustached man and the officer stopped and turned, staring. Tarrlok followed their gaze to two officers escorting a shorter prisoner with a black eye and his face wrapped up in cloth—

Amon noticed the mustached man first. "Oh, hey, you—you really came—?"

Then the boy's eyes widened from in between the cloth wrappings. "_**Tarrlok**_?"

Immediately Tarrlok and the mustached man shared a brief and awkward look, before Tarrlok turned his eyes back to Amon. "What are you doing here?"

"Um, sorry, I wanted to sorta surprise you—"

"Oh, I'm surprised, really surprised to find you in _jail_—"

Amon flinched. "Not what I meant..."

"_What are you doing here_? And where are **you** taking him?" Tarrlok spat out the last to the officers holding Amon, who also flinched. They straightened, snapping to attention.

"Sir, this one was causing a fight—"

"_Another_ one—"

"—in the holding cell! We were taking him to solitary."

Amon's eyes flashed, looked like he wanted to say something, but stayed silent.

"And how did he end up in a holding cell in the first place?" Tarrlok snapped, and the officers flinched again, which looked rather amusing in contrast to Amon, who stayed still this time.

"I can explain that," said a gruff voice, and Tarrlok turned back to the mustached man, almost forgetting he was there. "I was jumped. Kid helped me out—"

"You really don't have any witnesses of that," one of the cops holding Amon cut in.

"People jumping other people in the night tend to do that to avoid witnesses," the mustached man pointed out, eyes narrowed at the officers.

"Look, there was a disturbance, he was one of the primary antagonists—"

"And I don't count?" The mustached man arched a brow, and Tarrlok watched the whole thing carefully, including Amon's reaction. There was also something rather amusing about the boy's eyes darting around to all sides of the confrontation.

"Well, you are sorta—"

"Beat to hell, yes."

"And passed out when we arrived on the scene—"

"All right, bail. Now." Tarrlok snapped, losing his patience. It was getting late, and no one else was jumping to give Amon any sort of medical attention. Tarrlok was fairly certain he'd just spotted a burn on his arm, a black edged hole in his jacket's sleeve.

The sum was read, and Tarrlok and the mustached man—Lieu—agreed to split the amount.

"Have a place to stay, then, Noatak?" Lieu asked as he regarded Amon and Tarrlok outside the police station. Tarrlok inwardly mused that Yakone had really drilled that alias into Amon's head, sticking even when Yakone was out of the picture. His father had told the boy to give that name to anyone outside their little dysfunctional three-member unit; and now when it was just the two of them, Amon still called himself Noatak in front of everyone else.

"Yes, he does," Tarrlok snapped, tugging on Amon's arm. The younger boy pulled slightly away, toward Lieu.

"Wait, why _did_ those guys jump you—?"

Tarrlok and Lieu locked eyes over the boy's shoulders, before Lieu finally said, "Meet me tomorrow at San's cafe around 5—I'll buy you a coffee, give you more of an idea of why you spent half the night in jail."

Amon nodded, and the three parted ways.

After piling into Tarrlok's satomobile and driving a ways in absolute silence, Tarrlok finally said, "Do you drink coffee now? Because I remember you swearing the stuff off after the king of all caffeniated rushes when you were, what, six, nine—?"

Amon slipped down his seat and flipped Tarrlok a very rude gesture, which just made the older man smirk.

After another moment of silence, Amon asked, "I didn't ask for you. How did you even know—?"

"Gossip flies at city hall and one rumor sounded suspiciously too familiar—and why _didn't_ you call for me?"

"I—it just didn't occur to me—"

"_Brat_."

The adolescent threw up his hands.

"District Attorney, bailing his adopted brother out—does that sound good to you—?"

"If you didn't get into a fight in the first place—"

"What was I supposed to do, let them gang up on that guy?"

"You should know by know that it's a regular hobby in Republic City," Tarrlok said lowly, and though Amon shot him a filthy look, he said nothing more, and the rest of the ride passed on in silence.

###

At home, Tarrlok examined Amon for any other wounds besides the black eye and that burn. He found some, and began to heal them all with waterbending.

Amon broke the silence with, "Place is bigger than the last."

"Uh huh," Tarrlok absently said while he concentrated. Amon shifted uncomfortably on the kitchen counter until Tarrlok told him to stop.

"Have you eaten?"

Amon stretched. "Just need to sleep."

Tarrlok directed the adolescent to the guest room, and the lights were turned out.

###

Amon stared at Lieu. He blinked, took another gulp from his cup. Felt self-conscious again, though it was something he should've been used to by now—parting his cloth wrappings enough so that he can drink and eat, even in public areas like this. Even if Lieu had quietly and kindly tried to get a fairly isolated table.

Swallowing, the adolescent said, "A-a machine that can make power like a lightningbender?"

"Uh huh."

Lieu quietly regarded him as Amon stared again, took another long swallow of coffee. "Um—c-could I see what you have?"

After a moment, Lieu finally asked. "So, you know the D.A.?"

The adolescent slowly nodded. "His old man took me in when I was very small."

"Where've you been all this time?"

"Traveling." Amon rubbed the back of his neck. "The better to avoid the public eye. I knew it's what Tarrlok planned to do down the line, but it's not something I could ever deal with. And I wanted to see more of the world."

Lieu grunted. "Not exactly the safest place to travel around in by yourself."

The adolescent's eyes grew distant, looking down at his cup. "Yeah, but worth it."

"Hmmm." Lieu began to pull out his coin. Amon moved to pull his own wallet out, until Lieu held up his hand. "Remember, I'm buying. Now, I think you understand why I'm a little cagey about the machine after getting jumped by those bender factory workers last night. But then you did step in when you'd probably have been better off staying out of it, so...just understand this is sensitive information, all right?"

Amon nodded, and followed the older man to his workshop.

###

Tarrlok used his connections to interview the men who had attacked Lieu and Amon. He found that information was a type of currency that could go a long way.

The benders were stubborn, insisting Lieu and that "brat" started it. Unbidden, Tarrlok's smirk had darkened considerably; he didn't much care for anyone but himself calling Amon that. But the young man quickly turned it to his advantage; the men looked suitably intimidated now by his darkened, still smirking expression.

He didn't pull out a direct confession from them, but enough implication; why, if he felt so inclined, he could even build up a case, and for either side. But the information Tarrlok just gained was interesting, and gelled with some of the tension he'd been sensing from the power plant bosses, but had been unable to pinpoint the cause for their anxiety. Until now.

Tarrlok dealt with other business, and wondered when he'd see Amon next, suspecting the adolescent could provide him another source of information if the meeting with Lieu had gone well.

###

"You need a maid or something," Amon's voice called out as he entered the town house, and Tarrlok rolled his eyes.

"Hello to you, too," he said, putting down his paperwork and meeting the adolescent in the hall.

"For your information, my work is practically 24-7, and bailing you out didn't help any with my schedule—"

"Uh huh, can't you afford the help by now, though?"

Tarrlok huffed. Then said with a smirk, "Are you looking for a job?"

Amon managed to make a face from behind the cloth wrappings. "I might've been the help for some people before—never seen, of course—but there's no way I'm doing _that _for you and getting paid for it."

Tarrlok shrugged. "Not like you never did chores for me before in exchange for something."

"Or when we did chores together. Or when we _were_ the help for some people once to earn coin—"

The older man made a show of mock shuddering. "Please, don't remind me—"

"—_anyway_, you know it's different, Tarrlok. Besides, I'm looking for something else to do."

"Anything specific in mind?"

"Ah, I—I'll tell you when it pans out."

"Right." Tarrlok kept the playful skeptical voice, enjoying getting a rise out of the adolescent when he rolled his brown eyes. "Did Lieu give you dinner or something too? You were out late."

"Huh? Oh, yeah, I'm good..." The adolescent sounded distracted. "Look, thank you again for bailing me out, but...I was going to visit, but I wasn't going to stay, I've got enough saved to find me a temporary place until—"

Tarrlok waved Amon off. "Just save your money and stay here until you find your footing in Republic City."

"But—"

"It's not a problem."

Amon tilted his head. "Are you sure?"

The older man rolled his eyes. "Yes, I'm sure, I wouldn't have offered if I wasn't."

"...All right. Thank you again."

Tarrlok gave a noncommittal grunt. After a while, he finally said, "What were you and Lieu talking about anyway? Why _did _you spend half the night in a holding cell?"

"Oh, that—it was just a work thing that got out of hand. Rivalries, grudges, bad blood-that sort of thing, that's all."

"Uh huh." And then Tarrlok switched the topic to news about the city and asking Amon about anything he learned abroad.

###

Tarrlok knew Amon was holding back. It was likely Lieu had told the adolescent about the experiments with machine-made electricity the bender factory workers formerly in custody had described. And Lieu had likely sworn Amon to secrecy. Tarrlok knew the adolescent had a certain honor code, and it was unlikely he would break his word unless convinced it would yield a greater good. Hell, Tarrlok could always just point blank ask him and tell him he already had an idea of what Lieu was up to, make the boy feel as if he were caught and might as well tell everything.

No, Tarrlok wasn't bothered by Amon's mouth shutting up on that topic. What he was irrationally bothered by was how much Amon _did_ talk about Lieu without divulging anything vital. Well, perhaps not irrationally—Tarrlok was certainly just driven to his wit's end that Amon had dropped nothing key. That's all. It wasn't as if he was jealous of the adolescent's clear appreciation for the older nonbender and the increasing attention he paid to him while Tarrlok was away at city hall. Nope, not at all. Besides, Amon had said Lieu had gotten him the odd job or two at the factories. It was good for Amon to have an...ally, a companion, Tarrlok supposed. Though he kept thinking he should advise Amon to not so willing divulge his trust, or at all. It wasn't as if Tarrlok himself really trusted anyone, it just didn't make sense to him to leave yourself vulnerable like that when it was unnecessary.

And Amon may not have given him any intel, but he assisted Tarrlok all the same. The adolescent did the duties of a clerk somewhat, helping Tarrlok with paperwork he brought home, organizing it and such.

###

"So, Tarrlok, do you think I could maybe borrow your Satom—?"

"Did you learn how to drive?"

"I picked up a few things here and there—"

"Show me."

From the passenger seat Tarrlok reluctantly admitted Amon's skill was passable, but still he took the time to help the adolescent refine his technique, if only for his own peace of mind before entrusting him with the vehicle.

Tarrlok warily watched Amon fiddle with the radio while driving, but the adolescent still seemed focused.

"—D.A. Tarrlok's speech this afternoon—"

The radio crackled again as Amon switched it to a station with music. But the boy said, "It was a good speech."

Tarrlok blinked in the passenger seat. He hadn't expected Amon to listen. Caught off guard, he said a very simple, "Thanks."

"I don't know how you do it."

"Public speaking?"

"Uh huh. My brain would just shut down until the crowds left, then I'd run off and hide."

Tarrlok chuckled. "You have a very vivid imagination, brat." Then the older man shrugged. "It's just a conversation with someone."

"A_ lot _of 'someones,'" Amon pointed out.

"Well, it does help to pretend you're speaking to one person. Especially for beginners."

Amon made a little "mmhmm" and switched the station again when the song ended and advertisements started.

The adolescent stopped when it flipped to the news, becoming absorbed in another report of bender gang violence.

Tarrlok listened to the radio news as well, while also watching Amon closely, noting how the adolescent's eyes narrowed and his hands tightened on the wheel, knuckles whitening.

###

"Tarrlok hasn't asked you about—?"

"His only direct question was the night after jail and our first coffee, and I think he just wanted to know what the hell happened." Amon continued shifting around the workshop drawers, looking for the tool Lieu had requested. "I just told him it was work stuff. Though he's still asked occasionally since then, but indirect—just asking what we're up to for the day—Lieu, what's with the kali sticks?" Amon asked, intrigued as he opened a drawer and there they were, looking almost innocuous. He instinctively reached out, to touch them. The adolescent froze when Lieu said, "Don't touch."

Amon shut the kali sticks drawer. "So, what's with them?"

"Ancient history, kid."

Amon sighed, and continued searching for that tool. He opened a shelf, and there was a Blue Spirit mask. Finely crafted too. Immediately his hand reached for it, a warmth spreading through his chest at the memories. Unthinkingly he blurted out, "This is really well made—I remember my sisters telling me stories about the Blue Spirit, and then Tarrlok would tell—"

"Don't. Touch. That."

The adolescent hesitated longer over Lieu's dark acidic tone in that repeated command. He finally removed his hand from the mask's proximity and closed the drawer. "Sorry," he muttered in a small voice.

"Just find that tool," Lieu snapped, and Amon resumed his search.

When he finally had it, he raised it up, triumphant. "Found it."

Lieu gave an approving nod, and Amon continued to assist him with the generator.

At break, Lieu sighed over their tea. "Your sisters? I didn't know you had sisters."

"Yeah, I had them, and brothers too, before...before Tarrlok's father took me in."

Amon stared fixatedly at his tea, as if it was the most fascinating thing in the world.

"That mask was a gift for my daughter. She loved hearing stories about the Blue Spirit too."

Just as Lieu didn't press further for more on Amon's sisters and brothers, Amon didn't press for more on his daughter. The past tense was clear enough.

###

Tarrlok glanced at the factory boss over the wine. "And what of progress? I believe it's somewhere in your company byline..."

The elderly man fidgeted, looking uncomfortable. Still he said very firmly, "It's not progress if it steps all over my employees—you'll find that in our company byline too, concern for the working bender!"

_And is it progress if the nonbenders are never given the chance to advance?_

Tarrlok's eyes narrowed, his smirk widening. He sat back, watching the other factory bosses—hell, competitors—jump in, finding that they agreed on some things at least. Others of their party, other movers and shakers of the city joined in the discussion, their rather large tables swelling with their energy.

Tarrlok leaned back and watched the older men and women, idly sipping at his wine. _And what __**about **__the nonbenders? It wasn't as if they were the wining team_. Oh, Tarrlok supposed they could be. More-than-rumors of this electrical technology was another sign of nonbenders gaining their own footing and needing bending less, which frightened the hell out of said benders. Tarrlok found it rather amusing, watching them scramble at the thought, tighten the noose at the apparent threat... Tarrlok supposed it would be a natural replacement of the weak and the outdated with the strong and the new, as Yakone said. But then Yakone also said bending was the most powerful thing. And Tarrlok couldn't shake the feeling that father was right, not after all the times Tarrlok had bent animals and people and his own father and Amon to his will. He could feel their hearts move and the rush of blood in their veins, but less and less had they felt really alive to Tarrlok, not with the way they bent to whatever he wanted. Just inanimate objects he could manipulate.

Without bending, they were nothing.

There were exceptions, of course, emotional attachments to Yakone and Amon...but that was it. Tarrlok's opinion of people in general was low, but he felt even less for faceless and unknowable nonbenders. On an intellectual level, he knew they probably felt just as strongly as Amon or thought just as deeply as Yakone, but there was still the visceral fact that Tarrlok could just reach inside any nonbender and do whatever he damn well wanted with them. Such helplessness warranted little of his respect, let alone his concern.

Swirling the wine around in his cup, Tarrlok began to stare moodily at it. His mind had wandered to a dark place, reminding him how much he hated red wine. Tarrlok disliked how obvious he was when hating such a deep blood red color in his drink. Hated how for all his skill, he could never fully embrace the forbidden arts as his father had. Yakone had _enjoyed_ it; for all that Tarrlok found himself desensitized, he couldn't muster much pleasure in bloodbending—it was just a distasteful last resort, nothing more. But then hadn't Yakone let his passions get away with him, and wasn't it that which lost him Republic City? Tarrlok would be more efficient, he craved efficiency more than he did pleasure.

Another factory boss asked Tarrlok what he thought, and the younger man smiled, and shared.

###

"Attention future Councilman..."

"_Brat_."

Behind his cloth wrappings and the papers he was filing away, Amon smirked.

Tarrlok remained working at his desk, hadn't even turned to him.

"We should spar sometime. It's been too long."

Tarrlok didn't turn around. "Have you even thought about where we'd spar?"

"Well, I figured we'd just do like before—an abandoned building, or go to the more forested outskirts of the city."

"I have a better idea."

###

It'd been a while, but Amon still gaped at the probending arena. Had it been redone? It looked even nicer than before. (The adolescent remembered the slums and poor housing; Song's meager clinic and Lieu's own meager workshop.)

Amon shook himself, following after Tarrlok. "They'll really let us use one of their gyms?"

"Butakha will. Helps that no matches are played today, so they're pretty much closed except to teams practicing and a select few."

"Butakha—?"

"Owner of the arena. Got to know him better while you were gone."

Amon nodded, and quietly hung back while Tarrlok spoke to the larger man. It was always weird to watch Tarrlok put on one of his masks, such as the jovial one he wore now.

They got their room, large and spacious and all to themselves.

The adolescent had wondered if Tarrlok had gotten rusty, and he had—marginally. He could barely tell the difference. It certainly wasn't enough that Amon actually won a bout against him. Then again, Yakone had been very focused on Tarrlok's training, and Amon had thought he'd always risen to and surpassed the task, though he could never remember Yakone being that appreciative of it. Oh, he had given the occasional approving nod that Amon knew Tarrlok valued, but the boy had always silently thought Yakone was impossible to please. Was even withholding affection on purpose just to drive Tarrlok forward.

"You _have_ gotten better," Tarrlok remarked as he sat resting against the wall, Amon laid down beside him and panting. But despite his exhaustion and the typical loss to his brother, Amon felt a rush of warmth through his chest at the comment. "You move just like an airbender."

There was a question there. Amon had one of his own first.

"How would you know how an airbender moves?"

"Ah, that—well, Tenzin and I sparred once," Tarrlok answered with a satisfied smirk while Amon arched a brow that made his clotch coverings crinkle slightly.

"'Sparred?'"

"Mmhmm."

The adolescent just grunted, then said, "I met a former air acolyte after I left Republic City. She was kind enough to train me."

"'Former,' you say?"

"I didn't pry, Tarrlok."

"You're no fun."

###

"'Hey Lieu," Amon greeted as he entered the workshop.

"Hello, Noa." The older man was bent over his station absorbed in his work. Greeting out of the way, he immediately said, "Can you grab the—"

He turned at the last second to glance at the adolescent.

"—what happened to your face?"

The older man immediately dropped his work to check Amon, who bore a black eye

The adolescent shifted away. "It's nothing."

At Lieu's very flat- and blue-eyed look, Amon burst out laughing. "Don't look so serious, I just sparred with Tarrlok today."

"Does your brother always give you a black eye?" Lieu said, his brow arched, but the line of his shoulders was less tense.

Amon snickered. "His old man gave worse."

And there was Lieu's shoulders tensing up again, but Amon didn't seem to notice, just asking what Lieu had wanted him to grab.

###

The fifth time Tarrlok and Amon went to spar at one of the probending arena's spare rooms, Amon felt tricked.

"...You did _what_?"

"It's just a friendly little wager."

"_Tarrlok_."

"All the coin would go to you. You'd be the one earning it—"

"That's not the—"

"Please, like it doesn't tempt you—"

"Like it's much—"

Tarrlok quickly whispered the amount in his ear.

"...Oh..."

"Right? And it'll be easy money."

"But Tarrlok—"

"Ah, Noatak!" Butakha exclaimed, the larger man coming over and happily thumping the adolescent on the back. Amon was embarrased to find that he buckled, while Tarrlok had never done that whenever he'd seen Butakha thump him.

"And here some of my compatriots thought you wouldn't show!"

"Oh? Has the pot grown bigger?" Tarrlok asked, all smiles as he and Butakha shook hands, while Amon silmutaneously recovered and began to comprehend that last horrible implication.

Butakha laughed. "Yeah, if your kid brother can pull through, he'll make a small fortune..."

Amon was parts resentful of being called a "kid," parts certain that Butakha was exaggerating about the jackpot, and parts panicked at the thought of any crowds.

"But it isn't a match day today, it's never a match day today—"

Butakha gave another reassuring thump on Amon's back, that wasn't reassuring at all and made his knees buckle again. (What the hell, he should be tense at all times and ready to withstand any touch with weight behind it, even in something as casual as this, or more like nerve-wracking, but same thing, nerves or no he should be able to withstand _oh spirits not crowds please damn it Tarrlok_—!)

"A lot of the players besides the team you'll be facing off against wanted to watch, then there's all the arena personnel, not to mention some of my buddies—pretty much everyone who's placing a bet will be here—it's not a full house, but it's something."

Amon was still stone-still from terror, and as such didn't flinch as Butakha gave him one last departing thump on the back.

Tarrlok began to pull him away.

"C'mon, you should get ready—"

"Jerkbender."

"It's not public speaking."

"Clearly you didn't get that my issue was really with the crowds!"

"You've been trained to focus."

Even though right now it was just the two of them walking—well, Tarrlok was dragging Amon—through the corridors, neither dare outright say Yakone's name. Yakone had been the one to beat into both their heads how to focus.

"Yeah, but not with crowds—"

"It makes no difference." Translation: Yakone would say it makes no difference.

Amon sighed. "What exactly am I supposed to do? Throw one of the earth disks at them?"

"Some might say it's not exactly equal—while not really caring at the same time—but you're more than a match for an entire probender team."

The adolescent felt taller at Tarrlok's complete confidence. Hell, Tarrlok should be confident, after getting him into this. Frankly, Amon just feared any form of public humiliation at this point. That was the worse that could happen.

"So me against three?"

"Yes, and right now it's just evasion—Butakha's clearly patronizing you, but he'll be singing a different tune when you win..."

"How long do I evade?"

"For five minutes. You've been made to do longer with me, so this won't be a problem."

"And I imagine you set the terms."

"Oh, I just bumped it up to five after Butakha said three. And roughly like actual probending, you have to stay in your zone, the other team stays in theirs. Not unlike when you had to stay within the circle drawn in the dirt while I had to force you out. Now, Butakha offered you one of the uniforms—"

"No thanks."

"—didn't think you'd be interested." Tarrlok just took the adolescent's coat as they neared their destination.

"All right, here we go, just step on this platform—and for five minutes just dodge—"

Amon blew out a frustrated puff of air. "Right, be the leaf," he muttered.

"What?" Tarrlok shot him a very blank look.

"Just an Air Temple Island saying, or so Deshi told me."

"The ex-acolyte who—?"

"Yes—"

"Well, be the leaf then—"

And Tarrlok smirked, practically purred as Amon's platform began to lower. "—and don't fall on your face in front of everyone—"

Amon managed to flip him off before the platform made him vanish from sight.

###

Focusing on the rumble of machinery soothed Amon, but then the arena floor above him opened back up and light floooded his view and all around him were people and _holyshithecouldn'tdothis_.

Amon counted very quickly to five, then reconsidered. Like Butakha said, the arena wasn't full. So he wouldn't be making himself a fool in front of everyone.

But still he felt all eyes more intensely on him, on his stupid wrapped up face...

Catching sight of Tarrlok was small comfort. The older man just gave him a careless shrug, giving him a two fingered salute while he smirked.

Amon faced the probender team, sizing them up, as they did him—more critically than they, too. He could see it in their eyes—they already hadn't thought much of him, and that preconception wasn't changing. That could be useful.

The bell rang, and still Amon waited for them to make the first move.

First fire (ha, the universe thought it was so funny), then an earth disc and water, neatly circling by each projectile. As Tarrlok and Yakone had advised him, Amon quickly read the paths of their strikes, able to see all of them. And their strikes were slow—far slower than Tarrlok's or even someone trying to beat the shit out of him or just leave him for dead. Tarrlok was right; after Yakone and just everything else, Amon could take these three. As he continued to twist and duck and spin and generally dodge every attack that came at him, the adolescent mused it did help knowing that no one was trying to kill him. Took the edge off. Boosted his calm and confidence. He made sure to keep an eye on his zone's line.

The bell rang again, and Amon straightened up with his hands folded in the small of his back, just watching the opposing team gape at him.

The adolescent caught sight of Tarrlok again, and spirits, did he look smug to his fellow gamblers, all gaping.

###

"See, now that wasn't so bad. And you made easy money."

"How many times do you want me to say you were right?"

"You could stand to say it a bit more."

Amon grunted. "Do you plan to revolutionize probending then, hmm?"

Tarrlok laughed. "Please, Butakha's so humiliated, officially adding nonbenders to the fray is the last thing on his mind."

"Probably just wants to forget the whole thing happened," Amon muttered softly, trying to keep the bitterness out. Probenders were worshipped, and he'd just make a team of them look like children, but did that make a difference? No. The game wasn't about to change to accomodate those who could not bend. Probably didn't help that Amon had taken no real initiative, had just been a plaything to his brother and his cohorts, a novelty...

The jackpot money suddenly felt heavy in his oversized coat pocket.

###

"You've trained with Deshi?"

"Yes, ma'm."

"And what is your name?"

"Noatak." Same alias he had given to everyone in Republic City, including Lieu. It made him uncomfortable, but Yakone had also trained him to give that name up to other people outside him and Tarrlok. And Amon felt very self-conscious about Tarrlok's plans for public office. The boy still wanted his own privacy and he wanted his brother to do well; if anything were to happen, he could keep his name and just leave and do what he wished, and Tarrlok shouldn't have any problems. Not that he planned to make problems, but...well, he sorta did have a knack for getting into trouble. But only because trouble found him. Fighting with Lieu and ending up in a holding cell was a good example of that, and reason enough to try to keep an alias.

The elderly woman with the cane began to grill Amon on the human body and herbal remedies and such.

She nodded, face thoughtful. "I'll give you a week, see how you obey, what you do." She tapped her cane emphatically. "That week begins now."

Amon was set to organizing her herbal ingredients, and then when a patient came in, was ordered to help mix a remedy under her close observation. She accepted the remedy without a word. Another patient came, and the elder healer had him watch her deal with the case, and when she was done, asked him to explain to the patient what actions he should take to treat his ailment. Amon did, mostly confident with only a small bit of him anxiously waiting for the elder to correct his advisement. When she said nothing and the patient was let go, Amon calmed down.

As the day waned, the elder physician gave an almost imperceptibly satisfied nod. "Come back tomorrow morning."

Amon bowed deeply before her. "Thank you for this opportunity, Sifu Song."

###

Tarrlok rubbed his eyes, and readjusted the lamp on his desk, before refocusing on his paperwork.

He jerked when he heard the muffled scream.

Swiftly and quietly getting up, he went up the stairs and to Amon's room.

Peeking inside, he found the adolescent awake and shivering in bed.

Jaw clenched, Tarrlok poked his head in.

"Would you like a glass of water?"

Amon startled, his eyes darting to Tarrlok but taking a while to comprehend. Finally he gave a stiff silent nod.

Tarrlok returned with the water, and Amon thanked him. He downed the water quickly.

"...Was it the Box?"

"...No..."

_Your real family then, perhaps._

And they were his real family, in blood and all. As the years went by, Amon spoke of them less and less, but Tarrlok remembered how those stories sounded so damn foreign to him. The jealousy they inspired within him. He could never summon up the same uncomplicated warmth for Yakone that Amon had spoken with when talking about his own dead father.

Finally Tarrlok poked experimentally at an unspoken truth. "I imagine your letters weren't as comprehensive as they could be."

Tarrlok's imagination was vivid too, and he knew the world could be cruel to a lone nonbender. He had no idea what this brat of an adopted brother had to do to survive on his own.

"They were enough. Just letting you know I was alive and all."

And as Tarrlok suspected, Amon would probably never really tell him.

###

"I'm close to getting the job I want."

"Healer's assistant?"

Amon blinked at Tarrlok.

The older man smirked. "You're can be so dense sometimes. Did you really think I wouldn't remember you liked helping the healers at that monastery work?"

Rubbing the back of his neck, the adolescent said, "I know the pressure points of the body. Works for healing as well as fighting." His hand went up to his cloth wrappings, fidgeting with them. "And I like...fixing that sort of stuff, too." Hand falling away, he then murmured very softly, "You would've been a good healer too, Tarrlok."

Amon saw Tarrlok's back stiffen, and his own body tensed.

But the older man just grunted, and said nothing. Amon's body unwound.

###

Hearing Sifu Song console a crying and hurt girl, Amon waited outside, getting the bandages and such ready. The elder healer had asked her assistant to leave the room while the girl wailed. And so Amon passed bandages and a bowl of water to Song, only his hands visible in the doorway.

The adolescent's stomach twisted when he heard the girl (barely older than he) say it was a waterbender that attacked her. One of the Red Monsoons. _Bloodbender_, unspoken but loud enough already in Song's clinic.

###

Tarrlok would talk about work. Amon was a good listener. Good conversational partner, too.

"Everyone knows that they—"

"Everyone may know, but there is no concrete evidence."

"So they walk," Amon growled, slumping down at his new apartment's table. First night in, and he'd invited Tarrlok for dinner.

"There's also the power vacuum to consider," Tarrlok added, before sipping at his tea. He placed the chipped cup down. "New people filling the gaps in the hierarchy." Tarrlok picked up a dumpling. "Rather cyclical, really, not unlike the Avatar—there always has to be an Avatar—"

"So there always have to be criminals?" Amon snarled, sinking lower in his chair, kicking his feet out.

Tarrlok's smile was mirthless as he looked him over. "Ah, look at my little brother, pouting over the natural order of the world."

Amon rolled his eyes again as he straightened up in his seat.

"It doesn't _have_ to be natural—"

"There are rules, and there are people who break them." _Yakone_, the name lying silent and heavy between them, always the tiger-elephant in the room. Amon still wasn't sure what had happened to him, and Tarrlok never said. Amon couldn't even remember Tarrlok ever calling him 'father' or 'dad' or even 'old man.' It had always just been 'Yakone' from Tarrlok. (Amon remembered calling his own father 'baba' and 'daddy,' though by now he couldn't remember what his face looked like, something that left him with a dull ache in his chest most of the time.)

"There's what you call 'good' or 'evil,' 'right' or 'wrong'—but more like those with power, those without. Push and pull. A balance between the two. There can be no law without crime, and vice versa."

Amon idly picked at his food, knowing better than to say that Tarrlok sounded like his father (and looked more like Yakone too). But no, it was just a Water Tribe thing-push and pull. Part of their culture, their mythology, their bending discipline, their moon and ocean spirits.

###

_No concrete evidence _ran through the Amon's head. Mistress Song and he lost a patient today. A burned one. The family had cried. But they had other children. The parents had each other.

That was in the morning. Tonight he went to Lieu's, to help in his workshop again.

A cold dread settled in Amon's stomach when he saw its disorder. His mind jumped to the worst. _Oh no please no __**please**_

Amon breathed again when he found Lieu drunk and mumbling at his desk.

Knowing there'd be no work tonight, Amon went about helping Lieu up and taking him to his bedroom. He'd clean up the mess afterward.

"—that?"

"Easy Lieu, it's just me, Noatak."

"Noa? Hmm." Lieu's words were low, slurred, his eyes unfocused. "Shouldn't you be with your sisters?"

Amon felt as if Lieu had taken one of his kali sticks from the drawers and jammed it straight into his stomach.

"I...they're...they're in the fields, Lieu." He shook himself, continuing to support his friend.

The older man grunted. "Kiyo wants sisters, she's jealous of her best friend, her best friend has them, 'why can't I have sisters too, Baba?'" Lieu chuckled after quoting his daughter, and Amon was at a loss of what to do or say. "Good girl. Have I introduced you two?"

"Not—not yet, Lieu." Amon carefully opened the bedroom door one-handed. He entered, and gingerly placed Lieu on his bed. He doublechecked his temperature, he'd felt hot—Amon's hand drew away. Definitely warm. So Amon left the covers off. He pulled Lieu's boots off, and set them neatly down.

"I have pictures," Lieu said, his sluggish voice bright. His wobbling finger stabbed at a shelf. "There? See that album?"

Amon did, and watching the somewhat expectant look on Lieu's slack face made the adolescent follow his direction.

"Got it."

"Open it."

Amon did, and there were a few photos of Lieu, still with his mustache, but looking younger and happier. They included a dark-skinned woman that—Amon blushed as she thought how gorgeous she was. Stupid hormones. And there was a little girl, with pigtails in her hair.

"My wife, Paninya," Lieu murmured, his finger sliding over one photo as Amon gently presented the album to him. "And Kiyo—Kiyoha's her full name, she just turned four. She loved the Blue Spirit mask Pan and I got her."

And then Lieu's hand slid all the way off the album. The older man said nothing more, his eyes drooping. Amon gently ran a hand over his forehead, wondering if he should give him a cold damp cloth. Eventually the adolescent decided against it; Lieu was warm with drink, not a fever.

Amon was about to close the album and put it away, when he noticed newsprint paper peeking out from a sleeve. He pulled the article clipping out. It talked about in-fighting in a rogue metalbender gang. Countless casualties. The article gave the date of the attack—today's date, four years later.

The adolescent's eyes darted to Lieu, who was knocked out. Amon slammed the album shut and replaced it back on the shelf, then rushed out the room and back to the workshop to clean.

When he was done, he stared long and hard at the drawers with the kali sticks, and the Blue Spirit mask.

But Blue Spirit masks weren't exactly uncommon. And weapons training with Yakone and then during his own travels had not included kali sticks. And martial hand-to-hand, chiblocking was more his style, his strength. What Yakone had trained him the most in.

Early the next morning before work, Amon picked up a cheap blank white mask and cheap paint at two different shops. Probably better to just make his own Blue Spirit mask. Though at this point he could make anything up, really. But Amon wanted to cling to what pure hero worship he had left.

Amon would get concrete evidence.

###

In between cases and negotiating with the higher-ups, investigating the machine-made electricity and other going-ons at City Hall, Tarrlok barely noticed rumors of the Blue Spirit copycat. Just a passing curiousity before moving on to more pressing matters. He lingered a bit longer on them when many said he was a chiblocker. Tarrlok finally gave them some attention when the rumors did not die down, but rather grew.

He inwardly cursed the brat.

_tbc_

**A/N: Mistress Song is minor character Song from episode 2, season 2 of "Avatar: The Last Airbender." "Karate Kid" inspiration here if you can spot it.**


	4. in the gilded city part 2

**Title: misbegotten son(s): in the gilded city: part 2**

**Fandom: The Legend of Korra**

**Summary: AU. An adolescent Tarrlok tries to heal a badly burned child.**

**A/N: Tarrlok's backstory roughly based on this theory here at birdbrainblue's tumblr. And ep. 9 pretty much confirmed it. And now that finale double confirmed some things. Oh, that finale. Not a fan of it. So yeah, pretty much ignoring that finale for the most part, while pulling some elements from it. Not only because the finale doesn't leave me with good feelings, but because this fic has its own separate AU continuity now. 'Noatak' will be Amon's alias though. Thanks to overlithe for brainstorming and pteropus717 and everyone for encouragement.**

**Disclaimer: I own nothing related to the Legend of Korra.**

Finding evidence wasn't going so well. Amon figured he had to break into one of the gang hideouts and search, hoping to find some kind of documentation or something. Even for the hideouts whose location he knew, he had enough common sense to try running surveillance on them first. But it kept getting...delayed.

The first time he had donned the blue mask and tried to find some intel, he'd stumbled upon a robbery in progress at one of the poorer districts. An old shopkeeper couple held at the point of an earth spike. Amon had taken the thief by surprise, just jumping down on him and chiblocking at the right spots to knock him out and block his bending. The couple had retreated, leaving Amon awkwardly standing on top of the thief. Panicking in his head. _What now?_ This guy would surely walk, the only real proof he'd have of this guy attacking would be those two's witness accounts, and with them gone–

But then the female half of the couple warily poked her head back in, carrying a rope.

Amon nodded, trying to reassure her of his lack of ill intentions.

"My husband is calling the police to pick him up," she softly said as she gave the rope to Amon, who bent back down and quickly tied the guy up. He quietly told her that the thief should be out for some time and unable to bend until the police came.

The couple were joined by their adult son, his wife and their own children sent away to a neighbor's while waiting for the police. Other neighbors joined the watch in the store, crowding the building. They murmured among themselves.

Amon tried not to eavesdrop, staying out of sight. He'd lingered to make sure.

The police still hadn't arrived. The criminal woke up.

Amon swept back down in his blue mask, startling the current crowd and petrifying the gagged criminal.

"I–you said he wouldn't wake up or bend!" Snapped one of the neighbors, the story passed around already.

"Not before the police came. I thought they'd be here by now."

One of the neighbors grunted in disbelief. _I thought they'd improved_, but Amon didn't dare say the thought aloud. He didn't want to antognize the crowd more, nor draw attention to his own naivete.

Instead he said, "And he still can't bend. He won't bend for another hour, and I'll chiblock him then if the police aren't here yet."

The criminal struggled around his gag, his words incoherent while he glared at them all. The couple and their son and many of their neighbors shuffled uncomfortably.

"We can't wait any longer, we should just–y'know–we could–all of us–"

"Gao, are you insane?! We can't–"

"If he's with a gang, they'll retaliate–"

"This bender just can't just get away with this! What will the police really do when they come?"

"If they bother showing up..."

"The guy looks like a low level thug–"

"So you're a big shot expert in gang hierarchy now?"

"Actually–"

Amon's panic was mounting at the prospect of a lynch mob apparently forming before his eyes.

The masked adolescent stepped forward and before the crook could react, jabbed at him again, knocking him out.

"I'll just take him to the police station."

Amon began to drag the crook away.

"How?" A tall woman asked with an arched brow, and he stopped. "Gonna take him on the trolley? Do you have a car, a Satocycle?"

"...May I borrow–?"

"And how are you going to dodge the cops? I doubt they take kindly to people in masks. Are you going to give them a statement?"

"...I don't think they would accept mine–"

"No, they wouldn't." She stabbed a finger at him, beseeching to her neighbors. "This guy–"

"–saved our lives," said the old woman shopkeeper who'd given him the rope.

The younger woman sighed, grumbling, and offered to give Amon and his 'guest' a ride. The old woman shopkeeper asked if she and her husband may accompany them, they had to give their statement. Their son said he would be escorting them.

It was rather awkward all piling into her car, Amon dragging the thug inside.

"Y'know what, just try and duck down or something. Keep out of sight. Make sure the bender doesn't try to kill us all, Mr.-Blue-Spirit-Who's-Shorter-Than-Me."

"'Tara, don't tease," said the male shopkeeper. Presently the couple told Amon they were Mr. and Mrs. Kinomoto, introduced their son as Ming and the driver as Katara, named after the great war hero, though she insisted on being called 'Tara. Mr. and Mrs. Kinomoto went on about the rest of their family and neighbors, and Amon politley listened while crouched in the car out of sight with a firm hold on the bender.

Amon watched the police wires above once they reached the areas heavily criss-crossed with them. Maybe...

Yes, two officers zipping across. Amon wasn't the only one to notice.

"Hey, officer!" 'Tara shouted at them, immediately doing a U-Turn that caused Amon to hold on tight to the thug.

The cop behind called to the cop in front. They seemed to argue some, before the one in front continued on, while the other went back.

"Okay, just shove off now like a good folktale hero–"

Amon dragged the thug out of the car and just waited. 'Tara grumbled. Mr. and Mrs. Kinomoto piled out and began explaining to the female officer, while their son hovered over them protectively. Soon the officer took their son's and 'Tara's statements.

"And you?" The older woman asked, facing Amon.

"Like they said, I jumped the guy when he was threatening the shopkeepers," Amon said in a quiet voice from behind the mask.

"From where?"

"The rooftops."

"What were you doing there in the first place?"

Amon finally just said, "Are you going to ask me to go to HQ with you?"

"Yes."

"Right then." And Amon just flung the unconscious thug at the metalbender cop, then fled.

"Stop!" She shouted, catching the criminal, and bending to catch Amon too.

The adolescent leapt, using her projecting earth to make a bigger leap for the building top.

_Shoot_; Amon darted beneath some other metalbender cops zipping along the wires, and apparently he looked too suspcious in the blue mask. Not to mention they probably heard their comrades shouts to go after him. They were soon in pursuit.

Amon received one scrape from a glancing bent wire, but otherwise managed to lose them. Unfortunately the chase had taken him to the side of town that was the opposite to his apartment.

The trek back was long and tense, and Amon veritably crawled back into his apartment window, energy spent. Sitting below the window, with knees bent up to his chest, the adolescent pulled the mask off and tossed it aside. His still wrapped up face plopped into his gloves. _Big-time vigilante_, he inwardly scoffed.

And there were more robberies. Some benders just trying to make depraved sport of others. Some chasing women and trying to...

So yes, Amon kept being delayed. At times the adolescent was frustrated, felt like he was making no progress. But then he wondered if this was how the police saw these things as. Delays. Then the adolescent felt sick.

He remembered Deshi, and was somewhat reassured. The former air acolyte had once said all a person could do was help those near and dear. Though he had actually argued about it with her. There had still been something bitter about her when it came to that. Deshi said people trying to save the world only made things worse. Amon–Noatak, to her–had argued whether it was about saving the world or not, more could be done, surely. But she had swayed him–won the argument, anyway. Avatar Aang and his companions had tried to save the world. And what had they truly wrought? "What of your face, boy?" She'd asked. "What of your family, what of me finding you alone and beaten on that road?" Amon could find no answer to that, though he still wasn't sure if she'd been completely right. Avatar Aang and his companions had done good–they'd ended a war. It was just...they were older now. Out of touch. Was it really their responsibility anymore? They had families of their own. And Avatar Aang was dead now.

("What of your family, boy?")

###

"Noatak."

His shoulder was jerked.

"Noatak."

Amon's sleepiness broke away slightly, and the adolescent remembered to respond to that name.

He blinked the grogginess out, and turned to find Song, her hand on his shoulder.

"The day's over. Go home and sleep." Amon blinked, and realized he had slumped up against the wall on the way to the exit.

"I know, I was just...resting my eyes before grabbing a trolley," he muttered, voice thick with humiliation.

Song's eyes softened. Her hand tightened on his shoulder. "You're welcome to stay here for the night."

"Oh no, I'm fine–"

He gently shook her off, trying not to squirm with even more embarrassment.

"You just fell asleep against my wall," Song said, her voice turning more firm. "Fortunate that you didn't nod off during work."

"I would never do that," Amon said, looking his elder straight in the eye, guilt and shame now mingling with his embarrassment.

"Willpower can only get you so far when your body's not getting enough sleep."

Amon felt the need to explain himself, somehow. "I just–I just do other odd jobs, and I need t-time for myself–"

Song scowled. "Spirits, if you really are going to those races, if you're _participating_–"

The adolescent blinked. "What?"

"I've heard you talk with my neighbor Ranma about them, always practically giddy with excitement."

"Oh, those–!" And there was a laugh in Amon's voice, and by the way Song's eyes narrowed, that was the wrong tone to take.

"Noatak, I've dealt with patients from those races–I daresay you will too, eventually–so I _swear_, if you–"

"It's nothing to worry about," Amon tried to say levelly, but irritation still flared up. "And it isn't your place to decide what I do!"

"Remember that I am your elder and your employer," Song said lowly. The two glared at each other, Amon waiting apprehensively to see if he had gotten himself fired like an idiot. But Song said nothing, and Amon eventually swept out.

###

"Noa?"

Amon jolted awake, shaking the work table. Some stuff fell, and Amon scrambled to stop them in mid-air before they hit the floor. He caught some, but the rest clattered to the ground. Cursing, Amon bent down to gather them all up. His hand flinched as it touched Lieu's own, who had dropped down to pick up the tools, metal scraps and bits of wire too.

"Just put those back," Lieu nodded to the parts Amon had managed to catch. Slumping slightly, Amon obeyed, putting them back on the table. Lieu dropped the rest alongside that small pile.

"Not sleeping well?"

"Not sleeping at all," Amon muttered, rubbing at his eyes. "I'm sorry, Lieu, I didn't mean–"

The older man chuckled, clapping the adolescent on the back. "Relax." He gestured to his quarters. "Get some rest."

Amon shook his head, "No thanks. If it's all right with you, I can just use your kitchen and brew a cup of–"

The boy yawned.

"–coffee," he finished lamely.

A grin still tugging at Lieu's lips, the older man insisted, and finally Amon gave in.

###

Tarrlok scowled as Amon was struck in the shoulder by his water whip, despite his half-turn to dodge a full strike to his chest. Brat should've dodged it completely. Amon was being too slow, sluggish.

He didn't stop the spar. Pressing on with his offensive, Tarrlok did not let up on his attack. Clearly Amon's little Blue Spirit escapades were catching up with him energy-wise, but that was no reason for Tarrlok to give the younger boy any quarter. Especially since Amon was still trying to keep the whole thing a secret from him.

If anything, Tarrlok struck harder and faster, trying to get the Brat to come alive more.

Amon failed to withstand the increased assault. A bent orb of ice burrowed into him and his raised defensive arm, sending him crashing into the wall and unconscious to the floor.

Tarrlok let the ice melt and the water splash to the probending gym floor. He strode over to Amon, prodding him in the side with the tip of his boot.

The adolescent finally groaned, clenching his eyes and struggling up, coughing.

"What the hell is with you today?" Tarrlok snarled at him. Amon flinched, but not only due to his question or his tone; the arm the adolescent had raised for a poor defense jerked, and he grabbed at his wrist. Tarrlok watched impassively; clearly he'd hurt the Brat, possibly broke his wrist. Normally Tarrlok healed Amon with waterbending after every spar, but usually Amon performed admirably and was actually awake, not half-asleep and a disgrace. And he wasn't normally out being that much of a fool while playing at being the Blue Spirit–

It occurred to Tarrlok that an injury might deter Amon from vigilantism, at least for a little while. No waterbending healing would only prolong that.

The older man's eyes narrowed as Amon darted a look to him, then back to the wrist he held in his hand, and turning just so to shield it from view. Clearly the adolescent was embarrassed, too embarrassed to notice Tarrlok avoid starting the usual waterbender healing. He probably hoped the older man wouldn't bring it up at all. It was something Tarrlok could use.

"I'm sorry, Tarrlok, work's been...crazy, on all fronts. I haven't been sleeping as much as I should."

"Nightmares?"

Amon sighed. "No, just...barely sleeping, not sleeping at all. Been up doing the extra odd job..."

"Ever consider you're overextending yourself, then? Maybe you should clear your plate, so to speak." Tarrlok wondered if the boy would take the hint.

Amon just gave a noncomittal grunt.

###

Flexing his hand above his bandaged wrist, Amon thought it would be all right. It was just a wrist. It was just still an attempt to do surveillance. The city had to have an off night once in a while.

Amon actually made it to trying to enter one of the Rumblers' bases.

He had dodged the guards' notice, jumping the fence, running to the first building of the complex and sticking close to it. Next he jumped onto the metal crate balcony, then started to climb its ladder.

It was slow going. The masked adolescent went from balcony to ladder, stopping and waiting when someone stepped out onto one of the balconies. So far he'd been lucky, only balconies below and above him being occupied by no one looking up or down.

Less lucky were all the balcony doors being locked. Even those who went out and then went back in always locked the door after them. Should he try forcing one open? No, last resort for now, he didn't want to draw attention to his presence.

Maybe there would be an open entrance at the very top...

Finally Amon found a door left open at the next balcony above him. But he stilled as voices murmured below him. He fixated on the open door above him, a worry creeping upon him. How long were they going to talk below him? What if someone else closed and locked the door above him while he waited?

Amon continued climbing. He'd just be quiet, he'd just be fast–take two steps at a time–

Either Amon stretched his arm too far or too fast or both, but his wrist protested. Badly. Badly enough to make all of him flinch back, not just his arm. His foot slipped.

Falling back, arms too far away from the ladder bars now, heart pounding–

Amon slammed against the ladder upside down, one leg tightly curled around a bar.

The voices stopped murmuring, their faces gaping up at his blue mask.

_Shit_.

Amon launched himself from the metal ladder before it bent to entrap him. He hurled down face first for another lower balcony before flipping himself over and barely landing on his feet there, launching himself seconds later for the next balcony. Both balconies were bending into veritable spring traps that writhed. And there was still the ladder whipping out like a snake to grab at him.

The adolescent won the race against bending metal down to the ground, even though it felt like his heart would explode any minute.

Now he had to make it across all that earth...

Amon ran, tense and ready for–the ground started to fall out from underneath him, as expected. He leapt for and scrambled up the new pit's edge.

_Please project the earth please–_

A chunk of rock began to slam forward and Amon quickly jumped and landed on its tip, using the force of it to launch himself over the fence.

_Thank you thank you_.

The chase went beyond the base, remaining in Rumbler territory. But finally Amon seemed to lose them just as he did with the metalbender cops before, and he bore no other wounds, except for his wrist on fire and the rest of his body aching and exhausted. His heart rate slowed. He walked across the roof of a building next to a larger one left gaping from construction. Amon stretched his sore arms as he walked, massaging his wrist.

His stomach plummeted as the rest of him fell, his legs snapped back, pinned. Amon slammed down on his arms, his wrist screaming. Half a second later he was yanked back, and instinctively his gloved hands clawed at the ground, seeking purchase, anything to stop–but nothing, his fingers just raking across the roof. His elbows and knees and a lot of him scraped across the roof, there'd surely be scrapes or worse on the skin beneath the clothes surely ripped to hell by now.

The adolescent was yanked back so hard and fast he cleared the roof with barely a dip down in his arc. His stomach rolled around in his skin while alone in the air with nothing but metal coiling tight around his legs. Finally he was thrown down to a solid surface, though every inch of him screamed from the pain, particularly his back. It was hard to move.

Inwardly he cursed as more wires wrapped around his arms, almost yanking them out of their sockets as they pulled him up so that he knelt, his legs still tied.

"So you're the whelp who thinks he's the Blue Spirit," said the bender lowly as she finally stepped out from the shadows, her arms almost lazily curved in the necessary form. Her arm merely flicked to have another wire coil around his neck and force his head up.

Amon's throat was dry. There was nothing to say, he was paralyzed with terror. He was going to die or be tortured or both or worse. Worst being a grudge held and his mask taken off and they trying to figure out who he was and then trying to track down the people he knew and...

"Now you've been nicely breaking up the monotony in Republic City," she said, stepping closer, moving her hand to tighten the wires around him, making him flinch.

The woman was tall, with short dark curling hair. Her eyes cold and hard like green emeralds in the dark, rimmed with violet shadow. Her lips were of course a dark blood red, pulled back into a bullsharkish grin. Amon knew she was horribly beautiful, the most physically appealing of all the female criminal benders he'd fought so far.

The metalbender leaned down, a pale ringed hand grazing down the side of his mask. Played with his hood. The bile rose up in Amon's throat.

"Still, you were easy to catch, when you got too close." She tsked. "Not as exciting."

Her hand flexed, and the large rings on her hand bent, warping and stretching around her fingers, reforming into clawtips that glinted in the low moonlight. She began to tap the new metal claws against the side of his mask.

"I'm a freelancer, you know? Not much loyalty to the Rumblers despite our heritage, and my little fling with one of their lieutenants. But they would really appreciate me bringing you to them."

Her clawtips went below the mask, to where his chin was exposed, scraping against the cloth wrappings. Her smile widened at him.

"My, you do layer your face, don't you, Little Blue? Now I'm really curious about what's under there–"

And Amon trembled as her hand shifted to the top of his mask, pulling slightly on it.

"–but what if I'm disappointed? That's the thing with anticipation, Blue, you set yourself up for disappointment–why, I'm already disappointed–"

The freelancer rose up, her face angled imperiously up into the air, her hand flying up in dismissal. The wire around Amon's neck slipped off and whipped him across his face. Amon felt like something had cracked within him; his head was swimming. Fresh blood pooled in his mouth.

"–again, you didn't give much of a chase. You probably won't give me much of a fight even if I did grant you a chance to do so right now."

"I'm not here for your entertainment," Amon snarled in a low voice, suddenly reminded of Tarrlok's bet and the people watching and waiting for him to be beat by a bunch of probenders.

"Oh? If not for that...well, let's just say you'd have more than a pounding head right now." She patted his head then, and Amon dearly wished he could freely spit at her, wished that the mask wasn't in the way, _always_ in the way...

Then his heart pounded in his ears at the sound of an elevator-lift. After that, voices drew closer. Amon strained to see others coming. Then he thought to slump down. Play rat-possum. Pray it would work. Pray the freelancer might overlook, or somehow be fooled, think he fainted...

The freelancer sighed, looking irritated, though she also shot him a thoughtful glance. A group of men and women approached, and at the sight of them she released Amon from her metal. He made sure to not resist, to just let himself fall lifelessly to the ground.

"There you go," Amon heard the freelancer snarl, listening to her feet click away. He listened for the approach of the others' feet, their low murmuring.

"Boss wanted him alive–"

"Could be just knocked out."

"Still taking him back to the boss either way."

"Can we see what's under the mask first?"

"No, the boss–"

"We don't have to tell the boss..."

When he heard them get close enough, Amon snapped up and struck as fast as possible. Some were immediately chiblocked before they could move. The others...

The battle was a blurr. Amon madly dodged and chiblocked. Not one hundred percent successful. A section of the floor rose up and struck him in the chest, either cracking or outright breaking some ribs, he couldn't quite differentiate that pain at the moment. He managed to roll out of that fall despite the fire in his chest, dimly hearing someone shout not to use the building, they didn't want the whole thing to cave on them.

Someone's wire lashed him across the back and sent him flying, but at least he was sent flying into another bender, and he managed to chiblock that dazed one. He kept twisting and circling out of the way even when wires and other bent metal sliced along his sides and arms and legs. It was better than getting stabbed through the chest, as so many of the benders clearly wanted to do to him. Finally he was alone among the paralyzed, unconscious, chiblocked benders. Amon rather felt like collapsing down with them.

_Where's the freelan_–?

He jerked at the clapping. Holding his arm, he limped around to see the freelancer leaning against a pillar and quietly applauding. Then she gave him a little wave and shot out a wire for another buidling, then swung away.

Amon took the lift down the building and limped out, just leaving the gang benders. He needed to get away. He needed–

###

Amon woke up with a start. His room smelled like Song's perfume.

Then he realized he was in her clinic on one of her cots.

His hand immediately flew to his face–or would've, if it hadn't hurt so bad. Amon grimaced. And felt that obviously the Blue Spirit mask wasn't on his face, now wrapped in bandages, not cloth. Then he finally spotted the mask lying on a medical tray, scratched up. He hadn't realized the benders had grazed the mask too. Or had the freelancer lazily clawed at it, and he'd forgotten?

"You're awake," Song said as she entered, carrying a tray of tea. "Seems I was wise to grab a cup for you, just in case. Let me help you up, now."

And Song did, gently helping Amon into a sitting position. The adolescent couldn't look Song in the eyes. She had to fit the warm cup of tea into his bandaged hands.

"Thank you," he mumbled.

"Don't thank me–thank Lieu, for finding you. You were lucky to have strayed near his place."

At the sound of an odd step, Amon turned, and found Lieu–his face badly bruised and his leg limping slightly.

Amon's stomach plummeted.

The older man pointed to the Blue Spirit mask. "What were you thinking?"

The adolescent did his best to explain, his voice a low guilty scrape, his eyes glued to the floor.

Afterward, Song gave him a look, then glanced to Lieu. She murmured something about giving them time alone, and left the room.

Lieu sighed. "Well, this–" And he gestured to his wounds. "–isn't what you think. It has nothing to do with any bender gangs you angered." His voice softened. "So don't worry about that."

Amon blinked. "Then what–?"

The older man rubbed the back of his head, and Amon saw that his hand was bandaged too. "Just more 'work' difficulties."

Feeling cold, Amon pressed forward. "Do they know where the workshop is–?"

"No, I don't think so."

"But they were close to it?"

Lieu shrugged–and winced; apparently that shrug had been too much for his bruises. "Slightly. Probably best if I moved the workshop, though I'm not sure–" Lieu gave another shrug, no wince this time. "In any case, I'll figure it out. Won't be much of a problem."

The older man's attempt to reassure Amon only served to make the adolescent's stomach swim uneasily.

Song returned, and took Lieu aside, offering him a particular bruise cream to him, giving him advice on the limp, and all Amon could think was that he was a stupid, _stupid_ kid in a mask. He should've been there for his friend, not out there wasting energy and time almost getting himself killed and advancing nothing...!

And the fourteen-year-old felt so tired. What the hell was he supposed to do? What in the spirits' names was he supposed to _do_? He had to do _something_, he'd tried to do something, and look where that left him, abandoning his friend, risking his life for nothing, abandoning his _friend_, Lieu could've _died_–

Song made both Lieu and Amon stay at the clinic.

When the older man wished him good night, Amon could only muster a small "you, too."

###

Amon tried to ignore the pounding on his apartment's door. His head pounded enough by itself.

"Brat, let me in," Tarrlok's voice called from the other side.

Amon looked himself over–and gave up, he couldn't hide this, how physically screwed up he was. The adolescent left the kitchen and his tea-in-progress, his body slightly slumped over with resignation.

Opening the door, Tarrlok critically looked down at him, and Amon was made very conscious of the fact of how his brother was still taller than him.

"You look like shit."

"Feel like it," Amon grumbled, knowing Tarrlok was rarely so blunt. He opened the door all the way, and stood back to let Tarrlok in, hoping he'd just go all the way in and not put up a fuss.

_Of course not_. Amon irritably glanced away as Tarrlok took his chin, beginning to examine him more closely. "Sit down, let me fix you up–"

"I'm making tea–" the adolescent tried.

"Does it need your immediate attention?" Tarrlok asked, craning his neck toward the kitchen.

Amon muttered that it did not.

Not accepting any more protest, Tarrlok had maneuvered Amon to his small patched-up couch and veritably confined him there. Tarrlok tended to the adolescent with the waterskin he kept concealed on his person at all times.

"So did you start another fight?" Tarrlok said in a low growl, and Amon felt a hot bitterness roll around in his stomach. _If the world wasn't so messed up, I wouldn't–_

"Or–" and Tarrlok's voice lowered even more, slowed, "–have another of Yakone's 'old friends' found us out?'"

Amon recoiled, horrified at the thought (the _**memories**_). "No! No, that's not–"

Tarrlok's brow furrowed. "Did they ever find you on your own, before you came back to Republic City?"

The adolescent's jaw clenched, silent. Tarrlok blew out a frustrated sigh.

The silence was broken by Amon's groan, his eyes squeezing shut as Tarrlok tried to deal with a particularly bad wound.

"Amon, what _happened_?" Tarrlok's voice was severe, but the adolescent heard the edge of worry in it.

Amon swallowed hard, contemplating. Lieu had wanted to keep all his experimental work under wraps...but his damned coworkers kept harassing him, threatening him...and Amon didn't know what to do, he was so freakin' useless, helpless...the police were no help...but Tarrlok, maybe Tarrlok could help...

"I...I was trying to help Lieu," Amon began to confess in a small voice.

Tarrlok's jaw clenched, and he rolled his eyes, glaring. "And again you're beaten, worse than when you two first met, that catfish has been nothing but trouble–"

"That 'catfish' has a name, and don't blame him, it's not his fault–!"

"Then whose is it?" Tarrlok snapped, eyes narrowing at Amon.

The adolescent hesitated. He felt like back pedaling. Lieu really had wanted to keep quiet. "I–"

"Amon," and Tarrlok took his shoulder, after bending the water back into the waterskin. "Tell me."

From behind his cloth wrappings, Amon bit his lip.

Tarrlok seemed to consider, to hesitate, before finally giving the adolescent a soft, comforting squeeze. He lowered his head, to be more level with Amon's.

"You're not even old enough to be married," Tarrlok said. "You've been through a lot; you've been on your own–but you're still a kid. And I'm still your older brother, you can _still _come to me whenever you need help." His voice softened. "You've always been able to come to me–" Then Tarrlok sighed, glanced away. "–well, for the most part, anyway."

Amon gave his own sigh, slumping down and looking away from Tarrlok. He was just this stupid kid in a mask, just a cog in a world of adults. And Tarrlok was an adult. Tarrlok could actually do something. And Tarrlok had always been a source of guidance for Amon, probably the only one that lasted to this day. Not like...

In the hours after almost getting killed and finding Lieu beaten to hell, how many times had Amon desperately wished he could ask his parents about what to do? How many times over the course of his entire life had he wished for their guidance? How many times had he asked why weren't they just _here_ with him, though he damned well knew _why_. It was that bender's fault–and _their_ fault, father's for speaking up and mother's for getting sick and using up their money on medicine, and the baby's fault for making her ill, even all his older siblings' fault for attacking the bender after he'd struck father and mother, that bender's fault for valuing money so much more than his family, family that left him to deal with all the consequences on his own and–

And Tarrlok had been the only one. The only family to look after him all his life.

"Lieu...he's told you to keep quiet, hasn't he?" Tarrlok gently said, barely any pretense of a question in his voice.

Amon felt the anxiety creep up again. Tarrlok seemed to catch that, and hurried to add, "He probably only wanted to protect you. Give you reasonable deniability."

"I'm not the one who needs protectio–!" Amon then sighed, running a hand over his eyes.

"If you really want to help Lieu, I need you to trust me." Tarrlok said, gently taking Amon's hand and removing it from his face, making sure his blue eyes met Amon's brown ones. "You can't do this on your own."

Amon sighed, opened his mouth–the tea whistled.

"Let me get it," Tarrlok said, walking away.

Closing his eyes and leaning back against the couch, Amon began to tell Tarrlok everything as he went to get the tea.

###

"The Rumblers are smuggling in another shipment of opium next week, but they've been having some issues with in-fighting recently–helped along by yours truly–" and Yumi gestured to herself with a ringed hand, the other occupied with her cup of sake. Then she beamed. "Oh, and I ran into your darling little brother!"

Tarrlok's back stiffened. But once he'd put the bottle of sake away, he turned to her, his face smooth.

"Did you fight?" Just curiosity in his voice, mingled with some exasperated expectation. For the most part, he knew how Yumi was.

The metalbender waved a dismissive hand, rings glinting in the electric light. "Wouldn't call it much of a fight. But he_ is _young, isn't he? What is he again, twelve, thirteen–"

"Fourteen," Tarrlok said, taking his seat across from Yumi and picking up his own cup of sake.

The metalbender's hand snapped, pleased. "Like I said, kid didn't put up much of a fight." Then she leaned back, giving an exaggerated shrug, eyes demurely shut. "But, Little Blue gets points for taking down all the Rumblers that he–sure, failed to evade, but still, not bad, not bad at all..."

"'Not bad' can still get him killed," Tarrlok said, his mouth twisting. But still, he felt some small spark of pride over Amon. If he kept this up and didn't get himself killed, no bender would be able to touch him (except for bloodbenders).

Yumi cracked a green eye open. "So was he adequately intimidated? Sufficiently persuaded by our esteemed councilman's silver tongue?"

"'And do you get the second half of your payment?'" Tarrlok put down his cup, pulled out an envelope and slid it toward the metalbender. "Yes on all counts."

Yumi caught his hand still placed on the envelope, bullsharkishly baring her teeth as Tarrlok narrowed his eyes at her above his thin, cold smirk. She raised her sake. "Cheers to another successful business transaction between us?"

Tarrlok clinked his cup against hers.

**A/N: Sorry for the long wait, this part was tough! Thank you so much to overlithe, this part couldn't have come together without her! And thanks again to pteropus717 and plotdesigner! And this includes a Batman Beyond reference if you can find it. Also includes a parallel to Korra-the-character and teen Amon.**


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